Red Things
by GhostHelwig
Summary: Hakkai knows blood isn't the only thing that's red... Rated M for storyspoiler character death, violence, gore, and slight slash. Contains slight Saiyuki spoilers.


Disclaimer – I do not own or profit from Saiyuki. It belongs to Kazuya Minekura. So don't ask me for money, okay? I got nothin'.

Author's Note – This was written in maybe twenty minutes, and I have no idea what I was thinking. Very, very dark. Rated M for (story-**_SPOILER_**!) character death, violence, some mentioned slash, and gore. Contains **_SPOILERS_** for the Kanan/Hakkai storyline, as well as references to a certain conversation that took place, I believe, in the arc where we find out how everyone met. This story could technically take place anywhere you want, though...

Anyway, enjoy (if you can). Peace, all.

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Red Things

by GhostHelwig

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It was strange, really. Sanzo always seemed so cold, but inside he was warm. Inside his chest, his heart was full of warmth, pulsing with it, living... 

Hakkai could feel it, as he surrounded Sanzo's heart with his fist, could feel it pumping warmly, wetly, an utterly futile thing.

He could hear Goku screaming, in his head, and kicked the dead boy's form at his feet to make it shut up.

Sanzo's eyes were boring into him even as he died, full of accusation, regret - rage. Hakkai had always been able to read the secrets in those eyes. Annoyed by these thoughts and that dead violet stare, Hakkai shook him with the hand that wasn't buried deep in his chest, and his hanging head flopped backwards, to the side, golden hair finally hiding those staring, sightless eyes. What a relief.

Hakkai dropped the body to the ground, where it landed on top of Goku, a perverse, too-late shield. Fitting, really.

Especially when one considered how this had happened. Goku had raced forward to protect his master. Thus Goku had died first. Now, in death, Sanzo could try to protect Goku from raging, powerful demons driven mad by their pain...

For no - Goku had not died first. Gojyo had done that.

Hakkai turned to look at the body spread-eagled on the ground behind him. Poor Gojyo. If Sanzo had bothered watching out for anyone besides himself and that stupid monkey, Gojyo would have been protected when they were attacked by some idiot assassins of Kougaiji's. Sanzo could have saved Gojyo with the strength and power of his Sutra. He could have done something.

But he hadn't. And Hakkai had been too busy saving Hakuryu from the bastards who'd been attacking the defenseless dragon. He'd trusted Sanzo to watch out for Gojyo. Gojyo, who was neither demon nor human, who'd spent his whole life in pain. Gojyo had needed Hakkai.

No, that wasn't right either. Hakkai needed Gojyo.

It probably hadn't been Sanzo's fault Gojyo had died. Nor had it been Goku's. But Hakkai had killed them, blamed them and killed them, like he had slaughtered the villagers who sold out his precious Kanan.

He'd killed innocents then, too, and people for whom their guilt or innocence was not for him to decide. He'd thought that behind him. And it probably _had_ been - until he'd fallen in love again.

Kougaiji and his minions would pay for this, in blood. He would continue this mission west, and at the end he would massacre everyone trying to revive that dead god. Not for the sake of the world-

But because he wanted revenge.

If not for this journey, Gojyo would have lived. So he would finish this, all of this.

He wondered, briefly, if this was why Sanzo had been forced to bring them along in the first place.

It didn't matter, though. Gojyo was dead. And for that, the world would be bathed in blood.

Something squelched in his hand, and he looked down, surprised when he saw Sanzo's heart being squeezed between his fingers, blood and tissue coating his hand in crimson. Crimson, like Gojyo's hair that he would never touch again, like his eyes that Hakkai would never see again.

"You're right, Sanzo," he whispered to the empty air that hung heavy with the stench of death. "Blood isn't the only thing that's red."

He smiled down at the useless, ill-used organ he hadn't realized he'd ripped out.

"Love is, too."


End file.
